Welcome new readers of RMP’s quarterly H2 infrastructure report. Each quarter we look back on the major
stories related to hydrogen infrastructure advancements and we compare the
current AFDC database to the AFDC database in the prior quarter to see what has
changed. The AFDC database is updated by
the US Dept of Energy & can be found by clicking here. Canada does not have a centralized database
of alternative fuel vehicle information so we collect Canadian data by hand in
RMP’s own data tables. Ok, on with the
report…

Sideways. It’s the best word to describe the last quarter of hydrogen infrastructure development in the USA & Canada. All the Linde stations in California changed names in the AFDC database. Linde Emeryville is now Messer Emeryville. Linde San Ramon is now Iwatani San Ramon. Linde Mountain View is now Iwatani Mountain View. And lastly, Linde San Juan Capistrano is now also an Iwatani station. If anyone reading has links to stories about the change from Linde to Iwatani, please leave them in the comment section. No stories turned up regarding the switch from Linde to Iwatani when Google searching.

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On January 23, 2019, the California Energy Commission released a draft document on solicitation concepts for funding of the next round of hydrogen fueling stations. California will be awarding match funding to build out more HRS to hit the magic number of 100 hydrogen refueling stations at which point construction should be self sufficient. In order to be approved for match funding, applicants must meet the criteria laid forth by the California Energy Commission. The document the CEC published on January 23, 2019 is 42 pages long. In this post, respectmyplanet.org will summarize the key points of the document into approximately 3 pages of highlights. Respectmyplanet.org follows hydrogen infrastructure closely and we hope to learn from California’s leadership. RMP hopes to work with Michigan’s government and surrounding Great Lakes states to put similar clean energy legislative initiatives into place to help protect Michigan’s fresh water for the long haul. What follows is a condensed summary of California Hydrogen Draft Solicitation Concepts .

HYDROGEN DRAFT SOLICITATION
CONCEPTS

Timeline:

January
23, 2019 – Draft for solicitation concepts released

February
12, 2019 – Discussion about the draft & comments received will be discussed
at the Energy Commission Workshop

February
22, 2019 – Final comments for draft solicitation concepts are due.

Goal:

The goal of
the next solicitation is to provide grant funds to projects to expand
California’s early commercial hydrogen refueling and fuel cell electric vehicle
(FCEV) markets and to accommodate the projected FCEV roll-out in the 2021-2024 timeframe.
This network of hydrogen refueling stations, hydrogen fuel supply, and FCEVs
will support the carbon emissions reduction and air quality improvement goals
of the State of California. Hydrogen is one of the alternative fuels that
contributes to reducing the carbon intensity of transportation fuels. When the 2018 amendments to the LCFS
regulation are put into effect, the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) will have a goal of achieving a 20
percent carbon intensity reduction by 2030.

Suggestion to Applicants:

Potential Applicants to the next funding solicitation are strongly encouraged to discuss their proposed project(s) with the automobile original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), site owners, station owners, station operators, county and city governmental representatives involved with permitting, environmental review, and fire protection rules and regulations [e.g., the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) 2], and other key project partners.

Total Available Funding:

$110 Million dollars.
The California Energy Commission reserves the right to increase or
decrease this funding at its sole discretion.

Key Words:

“Tranches” will be used to describe the entire number of
stations from a single applicant.

“Batches” will be used to describe a subset of stations
within a “tranche” that are approved & in progress at any time.

Key Points Related To Funding:

Stations will be funded based on a dollars per
kilogram ratio within a 24 hour period. For example, if a station is proposed that will
dispense 5,000kg of H2 per day and funding is assigned at $2,000/kg then the
station will be approved for $10 million dollars. (i.e. 5,000kg * $2,000/kg = $10,000,000. This should encourage larger stations for
key population centers.

Match funding of 50% of all eligible equipment
costs will be supplied by the applicant, again no labor, fringe, travel, et Al…).
Only eligible equipment costs are
reimbursable & all other costs are to be paid by the applicant.

There is a single applicant cap of 33.3%. A single Applicant is eligible for no more
than 33.3% of the total funds awarded under this solicitation. This is referred
to as the “Single Applicant Cap.” The Single Applicant Cap shall not exceed
33.3% of all available funding at any given time. $22.9M of the total $110M will be available
in 2019, so therefore $7.53M will be the single applicant cap for the initial
NOPA. This departs from GFO-15-605 in
that the single applicant cap was previously 60%. So S.A.C. has decreased from 60% to 33.3%

Funding will be released in Stages as follows:

Stage 1 – 25% available upon completing
milestones such as preliminary design & placing order for eligible
equipment

Stage 3 – 75% available upon shipment of equip
from manufacturer & permit to build from AHJ (Authority Holding
Jurisdiction)

Stage 4 – 90% available upon open retail status

Stage 5 – 100% after being open retail for 5
years & submitting all applicable data to the NREL for their data
collection tool.

No Operational or Maintenance funding will be
provided in this grant. Operational
& Maintenance funding may be available through CARB.

Funding agreements shall be executed by funding
recipient within 90 days following project approval at an Energy Commission
Business Meeting.

Other Key Points for Potential Awardees

Starting at the bottom of Page 8 of the original document being
summarized, we get into the minutiae of milestones, requirements, and evidence
of support (Pages 9 through 42). If you’re
so inclined, like me, please read the document in its entirety here. Also, check out the California Energy
Commission’s webpage calendar event schedule here. The workshop meeting will be held February
12, 2019 in Sacramento, California.

From this point, on the remaining points in pages 9 – 28 of
the draft document are summarized/bulleted:

Five critical milestones must be met to qualify for stage funding throughout the process of building an HRS or batch of HRS’

Stations must be within the geography of the map labeled “Figure 1” shown below.

Stations must provide details according to the HySCAPE model scores (i.e. station throughput, capacity, delivery metrics, time between fills, et Al.)

Safety Requirements met (obviously)

Must dispense at least 33% renewable hydrogen.

Stations will be scored based on criteria shown in image labeled “Table 2” shown below.

Each of the methodologies on how to “score points” for your overall score out of 100 in competing against other applicants are described in detail on pages 29 through 42 of the draft document. Each scoring category is shown below in Table 2.

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Welcome new readers of RMP’s quarterly H2 infrastructure report. Each quarter we look back on the major stories related to hydrogen infrastructure advancements in the USA & Canada and chronicle them here. We also compare an AFDC database download at quarter end to the prior quarter’s database to see what has changed. The AFDC database is updated by the U.S. Dept. of Energy & can be found by clicking here. Canada does not have a centralized database of alternative fuel vehicle information so we collect Canadian data by hand in RMP’s own data tables. You’ll often see the acronym ‘HRS’ in this report which stands for Hydrogen Refueling Station. You can click on any picture within any RMP post and it will open a full screen photo gallery of all photos in the article. With that out of the way, let’s get on with the report.

A big story in 2018-Q4 is what happened just this past week: 3 new public HRS opened in California. The Citrus Heights HRS opened on 12/19/2018 under the Shell brand. And, the Palo Alto & Los Angeles Intl Airport upgraded HRS opened on 12/21/2018 under Air Liquide’s Blue Hydrogen brand. This is the first time that 3 stations opened in one week and it’s a precursor to a much busier year in 2019. Twenty-two new H2 refueling stations are set to open in 2019 which is more than any year before.

Air Liquide’s Blue Hydrogen brand hydrogen refueling station (HRS) in Palo Alto California opened to the public on 12/21/2018. This HRS is the 38th public station to open in California. (Photo: Twitter)

The overarching top story this past quarter, however, has got to be how Air Liquide is stepping up bigger & faster than anyone else in the USA’s hydrogen economy & elsewhere around the world too. Let’s look at some examples of how Air Liquide has stepped up commitments and more importantly their investments in the North American and global Hydrogen Economy. Both the new LAX & Palo Alto stations are operated by Continue reading USA & CANADA QUARTERLY H2 INFRASTRUCTURE UPDATE 2018-Q4→

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When China decides to invest in a specific industry sector for the good of their economy, they can fundamentally change the macro economic landscape of the globe for that economic sector. That’s exactly what China is doing by putting their economic might behind the development of the Hydrogen Economy. We have all seen this story before with solar arrays & renewable energy in China. The header image of a smog-filled Guangzhou skyline in this post is clear demonstration of both why China is embracing renewable energy and why they must. China has stepped up efforts to incentivize the growth of renewable energy and now has over 600 GW of renewable generation capacity and produces over 60% of the world’s solar cells annually. It took many years for China to affect economies of scale for solar cells, but we can now buy solar panels that have reasonable economic pay back thanks to China; it didn’t always used to be that way. Let’s examine why China is now putting hydrogen into their strategic energy plans with policies & incentives, just like they did for solar panels many years ago.

How Did China’s Air Quality Become So Poor?

China produced 3.2 billion tons of coal in 2016, or 44% of the world’s total, according to the International Energy Agency. China was also the top importer of coal in 2016. Coal plant capacity in China reached 942 gigawatts in 2016, up 42 GW from the previous year, according to the China Electricity Council. Burning coal releases invisible CO2 as well as nitrous oxides and particulate matter you see as smog in this post’s feature image. Diesel & gasoline vehicle exhaust also release CO2, NOx, & SOx pollutants, which compound China’s air quality problems from burning coal. While coal use is not going to stop any time soon, China plans to mitigate the effects of coal in a hydrogen economy by using modern coal gasification technologies with carbon capture & sequestration just like RMP has written about here. Getting the hydrogen they need from coal without polluting their air or water, China can begin a ramp down of coal use. One day, Chinese cities can enjoy blue skies and clean rivers. By using advanced coal to chemical technologies coupled with wind & solar generation China can have a one-two punch that tackles all their energy needs with no pollution. China can be energy independent and carbon neutral in just a few decades. The manufacture of hydrogen is a common denominator that makes a clean, sustainable, and job filled economy possible regardless of a country’s energy feedstocks.

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Fuel cells have helped push General Motors back into working with the US Military. GM recently created a new division called GM Defense LLC that is supplying fuel cell technology to the US military for land & submarine vehicles. RMP has done a quick write up with some pictures of the new full size ZH2 fuel cell pickup truck concept based on the Chevy Silverado that looks ready to be used in combat missions.

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This quarterly report looks back at all the H2 infrastructure activity from the previous three months in the USA & Canada. This issue of our report is focused on activity that occurred between 6/30/2018 and 9/30/2018. RMP is tracking Hydrogen Refueling Station (HRS) development as refueling is the key growth bottleneck to wide scale FCEV adoption. Awesome hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are already available and in production, we just need refueling stations. A lot of hydrogen infrastructure activity has occurred in the USA & Canada in the past quarter. The two biggest highlights in the last quarter have got to be Hawaii’s first public HRS opening in July and Canada’s first HRS opening at the tail end of June that just missed our Q2 publication cutoff when RMP was only covering USA activity.

HRS count of planned & active locations in USA from 9-23-2018 download from AFDC database. Hawaii ranks #2 in number of stations on the database. (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

Honolulu-based Toyota dealer and distributor SERVCO Pacific unveiled the island’s first HRS in Oahu after traditional Japanese Taiko drummers kicked off the ceremony. SERVCO, a local 100-year-old company, hopes that the availability of hydrogen to power passenger cars will spur sales of fuel cell vehicles (FCEVs) on Oahu and eventually other Hawaiian Islands. Hawaii already ranks 2nd in the USA for number of planned & active stations in a state with nine. In fact the SERVCO station has been on RMP’s Map of all HRS in the USA since we started making our map (view our map here). Now, the SERVCO station is open to the general public.

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This quarterly report looks back at all the H2 infrastructure activity from the previous three months. This issue of our report is focused on activity that occurred between 3/31/2018 and 6/30/2018. With things happening faster now than they have in the past, we may need to make this a monthly report in the near future. If you like keeping up to date on RMP’s H2 data observations, please subscribe to our blog by entering your email address in the WordPress subscribe widget. RMP uses the AFDC database as our main source to generate the information in this report. Several data updates on the Alternative Fuels Data Center database occurred this quarter, which is the 2nd straight quarter RMP has monitored higher frequency in data updates since we started following the AFDC database over six years ago. The AFDC database is also the main source of RMP’s Hydrogen Station Map. Areas of the database that have been stagnate for years, now show an increased frequency in updates. RMP notices every small change from quarter to quarter using special data analytics techniques developed over years of tracking environmental data & creating our environmental Google maps. You can help RMP improve our research & publications by making a tax-deductible donation (USA only) by clicking here.

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Respectmyplanet.org has created a new quarterly report called the USA H2 Infrastructure Quarterly Update. This is our 2nd report since our inaugural report on 12/31/2017, but our first with the new ‘quarterly’ title. You can read our first H2 infrastructure update report published in December by clicking here. A quarterly frequency should be appropriate to report on H2 station construction & news in the USA, but things are certainly happening faster now than they have in the past. This report may need to become a monthly report in the near future if the pace continues to quicken.

The MDEQ publishes full year numbers for hydrocarbon production about 4 to 5 months lagging behind calendar date. That means these 2016 full year numbers are a little late, but better late than never. The good news is 2017 results will be ready in May of this year so full year results for 2017 will be just around the corner.